Humanitarian Award

Larry Hess (M.D. ’85)

Larry Hess is a semi-retired board-certified general obstetrician-gynecologist. He grew up in San Diego and graduated from UC San Diego before arriving at UC Davis, where he met and married Dr. Janet Semple-Hess after meeting in neuroanatomy.

He completed his residency at the Washington Hospital Center in Washington, D.C., before joining the Permanente Medical Group at Kaiser Woodland Hills in the Los Angeles area.

Starting in the early ’90s, Larry Hess helped pioneer minimally invasive gynecology and hysteroscopy within the Kaiser system, and helped launch a robust practice regionally. In addition to teaching surgery, he has consistently taught GYN and family medicine residents throughout his career.

His MIS and teaching interests led him to, with the help of a community general surgeon, set up an independent minimally invasive training center at a small public hospital in Jamaica. This program expanded over the years to include multiple locations in Jamaica, and trainees visited from many other Caribbean nations. It lasted over 15 years until COVID curtailed it.

Hess also participated in a UCLA urogynecology team in Uganda. He taught medical students, OB-GYN residents, and nurses in basic science, general OB-GYN, and surgical technique and theory, while experiencing medicine in a developing country with very different challenges.

He has retired from full-time work at Kaiser and enjoys part-time duties as an OB-GYN hospitalist at a large community hospital in Los Angeles.

Distinguished Alumnus Award

RADM Kenneth Bernard (M.D. ’75), USPHS (Ret.)

Rear Admiral Kenneth Bernard, USPHS (RET.), is a distinguished visiting fellow at the Hoover Institution, where his work in the Bio-Strategies and Leadership Group helps ensure the U.S. advances its international economic and technical competitiveness in biotechnology, as well as enhances and protects U.S. national security. He served in the George W. Bush White House as special assistant to the president for biodefense and assistant surgeon general. After leaving the federal government, he became senior political adviser to the director-general of the World Health Organization.

In the Bush White House, Bernard directed policy development to prevent, mitigate and respond to chemical, biological, and radiological attacks by states or terrorist groups. Following Sept. 11, he created the position of special adviser for national security, intelligence and defense for the secretary at the Department of Health and Human Services, where he coordinated development of intelligence infrastructure around WMD threats.

In the Bill Clinton White House, as a flag officer in the U.S. Public Health Service, he was detailed as a senior adviser for security and health on the National Security Council staff. Bernard served as international health attaché at the U.S. Mission to the UN, and was head of the U.S. delegation negotiating the Framework Convention on Tobacco Control.

Bernard began his career as a viral disease epidemiologist at the Centers for Disease Control, where he became the nation’s leading expert on human rabies. He has received several medals for service from the USPHS, Surgeon General, and Secretary of Defense.

Transformational Leadership Award

James A. Gaudino, Jr. (M.D. ’85, M.S. ’80, M.P.H. ’87, FACPM)

Jim Gaudino is a preventive medicine and public health physician, epidemiologist, health consultant and affiliate professor. With 35+ years of on-the-ground public health practice and research, he has led and collaborated with many teams in every sector of public health, including federal, tribal, state and local.

He graduated with his M.D. from UC Davis, completed two master’s degrees in biostatistics and epidemiology, an internship in internal medicine, and a preventive medicine residency. He is board-certified in general preventive medicine and public health. He began his career at a Bay Area local public health department during the first wave of the HIV epidemic.

After joining the CDC and completing its epidemic intelligence service post-graduate fellowship, Gaudino has gone on to passionately support and build the capacity of public health departments and health care organizations to use the power of epidemiology and evidence in policies and programs addressing the health and well-being of communities, especially the vulnerable. He has worked on issues like communicable disease; maternal, child and family health; immunization; vaccine hesitancy; firearm injury prevention; and patient engagement.

Gaudino is an affiliate professor with the OHSU-PSU and UW Schools of Public Health. He has served as a leader in various organizations, including the American Public Health Association. In 2006, he helped to found and now serves with the International Network for Epidemiology In Policy, comprised of leaders from 26 professional epidemiology societies on six continents. He continues to advocate for strong public health systems and practices in communities everywhere.